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Thus we have here one identical Principle, the Intellect,
which is the universe of authentic beings, the Truth: as such it
is a great god or, better, not a god among gods but the Godhead
entire. It is a god, a secondary god manifesting before there is
any vision of that other, the Supreme which rests over all,
enthroned in transcendence upon that splendid pediment, the
Nature following close upon it.
The Supreme in its progress could never be borne forward upon
some soulless vehicle nor even directly upon the soul: it will be
heralded by some ineffable beauty: before the great King in his
progress there comes first the minor train, then rank by rank the
greater and more exalted, closer to the King the kinglier; next
his own honoured company until, last among all these grandeurs,
suddenly appears the Supreme Monarch himself, and all- unless
indeed for those who have contented themselves with the spectacle
before his coming and gone away- prostrate themselves and hail
him.
In that royal progress the King is of another order from those
that go before him, but the King in the Supreme is no ruler over
externs; he holds that most just of governances, rooted in
nature, the veritable kingship, for he is King of Truth, holding
sway by all reason over a dense offspring his own, a host that
shares his divinity, King over a king and over kings and even
more justly called father of Gods.
[Interpolation: Zeus (Universal Soul) is in this a symbol of him,
Zeus who is not content with the contemplation of his father
(Kronos, divine Intellect) but looks to that father's father (to
Ouranos, the Transcendent) as what may be called the divine
energy working to the establishment of a real being.]
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